At the Ambassadors’ Academy, you will get equipped to serve as a bold ambassador of Christ and gain a new passion for the lost. Hosted by seasoned evangelist Ray Comfort and the Living Waters team, this intensive evangelism training will give you all the tools you need, regardless of your level of experience. You will be able to share the gospel in several iconic Southern California settings, such as the Santa Monica Pier and Huntington Beach, and will enjoy a tremendous time of spiritual growth and personal encouragement.

About James White
James White is the director of Alpha and Omega Ministries, a Christian apologetics organization based in Phoenix, Arizona. He is the author of more than twenty four books, a professor, an accomplished debater, and an elder of the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church.
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What is the effectiveness of apologetics ? The Holy Scriptures tell us that God has revealed himself to mankind but that humanity as a whole does not want God (Romans 1:18-20). This leads people to create crafty ways in which to avoid God. Jesus also revealed the inner depths of the human psyche in this exchange of God’s wooing and the human response to that truth in the Parable of the Sower (Matthew 13:3-23, Mark 4:2-20, Luke 8:4-18). In this parable, the sower (one who relays God’s truth) scatters seeds (the truth of God) and the seeds fall on four different kinds of ground (types of human dispositions).

Apologetics and worship? Aren’t those mutually exclusive? Christian apologetics, the reasoned defense of the faith, is often seen as rather dry and clinical – a very cold, sterile niche of Christianity set aside for those kinda weird nerds or those that are a little more quarrelsome than they should be. Meanwhile, worship is of the heart, not the head, right? Well, this nerd begs to differ. Worship is certainly more than feelings. I would dare say that many mistake the beat of a good tune for the moving of the Spirit of God, but I digress….

For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

I used to think that Christians had two brains—one was lost and the other was out looking for it. For me, the "faith" of Christianity was an arbitrary decision to dogmatically believe in something despite all the evidence to the contrary. I thought faith was blind. So, when a group of Christians challenged me to investigate the evidence for Christianity intellectually, I thought it was a joke. I accepted their challenge, fully intending to destroy Christianity and rub it in their faces.

This book had great potential, when he actually gets into the apologetic part of the book it's great material.there are principles in this book, that if studied and applied would definitely help equip one to defend their faith. I especially like the portion of this book that harmonize the gospels and feel that any Christian can benefit from that study, Pearson does a great job reconciling so called contradictions in the new testament. The only negatives is this book is slow getting started, and very much overillistrates, a lot more apologetic material could have been implemented in this book if not for the many illustrations.

Some time ago I wrote a post called “ Why I Trust the Bible .” In that article, I gave five reasons why I personally believe the Bible to be trustworthy. There are, of course, many more reasons than that to believe the Bible is true, so I thought it would be a good idea to share five more reasons why we can trust the Bible. We have confidence in the Bible as God’s true and trusted speech to us because:

“Our underlying goal for the staff and members at CrossFit Infiltrate…is total health and well-being for the individual and the community,” wrote the management in a group email. “We believe that true health forever can only be found within humility, not pride…As a business we will choose to deploy our resources towards those efforts and causes that line up with our own values and beliefs.”

Christianity is distinct in the nature of its claims and the value it places on reason, intelligence, and evidence. Some religious systems are based purely on the doctrinal, proverbial statements of their founders. The wisdom statements of Buddha, for example, lay the foundation for Buddhism. Hinduism is based on the revelations of the ancient sages as revealed in the Vedas and the Upanishads . Confucianism is established from the wisdom statements of Confucius. In all these examples, the statements of these religious leaders exist independently of any event in history. In other words, these systems rise or fall on the basis of ideas and concepts rather than on claims about a particular historical event .

Two quick tips here. When you read the Bible you need to understand the historical backdrop of the text. For example, the Old Testament needs to be understood in light of the Ancient Near East. And the New Testament needs to be understood in light of a largely Jewish mindset emerging in a world heavily influenced by Greco-Roman Culture.

Josh’s second question is “Where do you see his works most clearly?” My answer is that wherever saving truth is hated and resisted and distorted and muted, Satan is at work so that people are kept from being saved by the truth of the gospel. That’s where I see his works most clearly.

There is no question that there are flood stories across many times and cultures. Indeed, some young earth creationists cite this as the single best evidence for a global flood. What is most interesting, however, is the total similarity between some earlier flood stories from the same Ancient Near Eastern time and place as what the Noahic deluge story would later originate. Montgomery surveys this early history, noting the amazing discovery of more ancient flood myths in Sumerian writings. At least 3 different flood stories were discovered in these ancient fragments, and they yielded many similarities with the biblical flood account (153ff). Alongside discoveries like this, the rise of deism threatened Christianity and led to some reactionary responses to both the discoveries and the age. On the other hand, many Christian theologians moved to see Genesis as “a synopsized or allegrical explanation of how the world came to be rather than a comprehensive history of everything that ever existed” (167).

It’s true that our leaders are doing much good in many ways. It’s also true that we have been compromised, fearful, spineless, and visionless when it comes to one of the greatest moral crises in history.

Chaperones are molecular machines that help large, complex proteins achieve their native fold. Many polypeptides do not need chaperones to fold, but they are subject to misfolding as they emerge from the ribosome. In a lab dish, the HaloTag protein studied here is subject to collapsing into a useless aggregate instead of properly folded, functional machine. Since that doesn’t happen in a live cell, something must be preventing it. That something is a “rerouting of the folding pathway” that ensures quality control and folding efficiency. Do the authors speculate on how such a clever mechanism might have evolved? Cue the crickets. Rather, they were happy just to “systematically investigate how the translational and quality control machinery modulates protein folding.”

That consideration was compromised, however, by the Commission’s treatment of Phillips’ case, which showed elements of a clear and impermissible hostility toward the sincere religious beliefs motivating his objection. As the record shows, some of the commissioners at the Commission’s formal, public hearings endorsed the view that religious beliefs cannot legitimately be carried into the public sphere or commercial domain, disparaged Phillips’ faith as despicable and characterized it as merely rhetorical, and compared his invocation of his sincerely held religious beliefs to defenses of slavery and the Holocaust. No commissioners objected to the comments. Nor were they mentioned in the later state-court ruling or disavowed in the briefs filed here. The comments thus cast doubt on the fairness and impartiality of the Commission’s adjudication of Phillips’ case.

Where the Spirit of God is there must be love, and if I have once known and recognized any man to be my brother in Christ Jesus, the love of Christ constraineth me no more to think of him as a stranger or foreigner, but a fellow citizen with the saints. Now I hate High Churchism as my soul hates Satan; but I love George Herbert, although George Herbert is a desperately High Churchman. I hate his High Churchism, but I love George Herbert from my very soul, and I have a warm corner in my heart for every man who is like him. Let me find a man who loves my Lord Jesus Christ as George Herbert did and I do not ask myself whether I shall love him or not; there is no room for question, for I cannot help myself; unless I can leave off loving Jesus Christ, I cannot cease loving those who love him. ( The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit Sermons , vol. XII, 6)

Evolution supposedly progresses by the death of the less fit and the reproduction of the most fit. So, if this the case, why should we help the old, sick, infirm, and disabled? Shouldn’t they be eliminated as less fit? After all, in the world of evolution the strong survive, and tough for you if you’re born weak or less fit. According to an evolutionist’s own worldview, how can death, disease, suffering, cancer, and disabilities really be “bad”? In nature, the weak and ill die off and the strong survive, passing on their good genes to the next generation—this is how evolution supposedly progresses. Death and weakness from disease and mutations is a must for “bad” genes to die out. So by what standard do evolutionists call these things bad? Certainly not by their own standard! To claim a standard for good and bad, they have to borrow from a different worldview—the biblical one—to define what good and bad even are.

What to pray for this week: Pray that God would show us how much He loves the world. Pray that we would see the forgiveness He offers even to those who defy Him, who have committed an abortion. Download 21 Days of Prayer for Life! bit.ly/2CkG6ff pic.twitter.com/SKbd1RnmuB

Humble waiting looks like this: “Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him” (Psalm 37:7). And, yes, this can be difficult. God knows this. That’s why the Bible is chock-full of examples of what difficult waiting looks like. God wants us to know that he understands, and he wants us to believe that “all things are possible for one who believes” (Mark 9:23). It is possible to wait in the patient peace of faith.

ABDU MURRAY: Thanks for the opportunity to share about the book, Sean. The title is meant to be a double-entendre. In and of itself, truth doesn’t need saving but it does need to be saved in the sense that we’ve lost our emphasis on it as a culture. We’re in a “post-truth” society, which elevates personal preferences and feelings over facts and truth. We don’t deny that truth exists, we just subordinate it to our preferences. We think that this will lead to freedom and human dignity and flourishing. But it won’t. It will lead to chaos because truth no longer serves as the standard by which to judge human preferences and opinions. That’s why we’re seeing such vilification of “them.” Whoever disagrees with our preferences is automatically a villain, even if the truth is on their side. We need to recover our love of the truth and its primacy if we’re to escape the chaos that so laces our cultural climate. When we see that truth is the lens through which we should shape and express our preferences, we’ll see the truth that we are made in God’s image and that Jesus redeemed that image at the cross.

The students of the apostles played a pivotal role in preserving and promoting the eyewitness Gospel accounts. While many skeptics claim the New Testament Canon was formed during 4 th Century Church Councils (such as the Council of Nicea or Laodicea), the earliest believers had already preserved the canonical gospels and letters centuries prior . In fact, the early Church leaders prior to the first council at Nicea (known as the Ante-Nicene Church Fathers), began to collect and affirm the canon of Scripture in three separate geographical areas . The first surviving list of canonical texts dates to approximately 170AD in what is now known as the “Muratorian Fragment”, a partial copy of an ancient text discovered in the Ambrosian Library in Milan in the 18th century. This document affirmed and acknowledged Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 Thessalonians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon, Jude, 1 John, 2 John and Revelation as reliable, apostolic Scripture. The author of the Muratorian Fragment was also careful to warn his readers about Paul’s alleged letters to the Laodiceans and Alexandrians, and a document known as the “Apocalypse of Peter” (identifying these as forgeries).

It is a good question, and I would expect nothing less from the friend who had asked it. Its not just a question those outside of Christianity would have. I would expect only a few people could provide a well-reasoned answer in any given congregation on a Sunday morning. So, let me attempt a brief reply. I know the best way to tackle any problem is to understand what you are addressing clearly. The first step is to define terms (sometimes just doing that can give you an answer). Let’s hear what the Oxford Dictionary has to say:

To Eric, my brother in Christ, I have three things to say. (1) The two of us will never agree about Trump or a whole host of other issues, theological and political. But you already know that. (2) I pray that you will have a Flannery O’Connor-like revelation, the kind that slowly but effectively burns away our most grotesque qualities as the capaciousness of God’s grace settles upon us. I pray the same for myself. (3) Thank you for giving me a glimpse—even if transient—of the ways partisan divisions are transcended by the one whose life, death, and resurrection gives us our life.

Episode Descriptions: On Day 25 of "Islamicize Me," the gang's dhimmi decides to become a Muslim, and the gang figures out a way to deal with the infamous Robert Spencer! On Day 26 of "Islamicize Me," the Halal Heroes send in their ultimate weapon to end the Muhammad cartoon contest. But will Jihad Junior be able to stand against the Kafir King (Robert Spencer)? Subscribe & click the bell - for notifications of new uploads! New uploads weekly! Help keep putting this content out by giving support @ https://www.patreon.com/vocab https://www.paypal.me/vocabmalone/25 https://cash.me/$VocabMalone

The field of archaeology demonstrates that the Bible is historically accurate. Now, this does not mean that it is inherently “true.” It does mean that it is reliable in its historical details—which gives some pretty good credibility to what else it has to say. If we can trust that the Bible accurately records for us geographical places (Israel, Egypt, Babylon, etc.) and historical people (Herod or Pontius Pilate, for example), it’s very likely it has many other true things to say. One reason I could never trust the Book of Mormon, in contrast, is that most of the places listed in its geography are make-believe. It’s very difficult for me to trust a book that is claiming to be nonfiction when its geography is clearly fiction.

We have been laying out a “Case for the Bible” over the past few months and the evidence collection has been based on a question that many have posed: How do we know the Bible is the Word of God? You can be skeptical of the Bible, as I once was, but at some point, in light of the avalanche of evidence, you have to pause and ask yourself: Could it be true? If there is at least a 50/50 chance based on the evidence you’ve seen here that the Bible is the Word of God (and it’s so much more than that) don’t you owe it to yourself to consider it?

In the piece, Kissinger sounds an alarm over artificial intelligence, and raises questions about machine ethics and the possibility that humans may learn we’re not so special after all. Richards, author of the forthcoming book The Human Advantage: The Future of American Work In an Age of Smart Machines , pushes back, explaining how we can continue to use artificial intelligence to our advantage, prudently but without fear of the robot apocalypse or of computers becoming conscious and free.

Professionalism in the college classroom is on the decline. Since the 2016 election, professors all around my campus (UNC-Wilmington) have become much more inclined to use the classroom as a platform to spout political beliefs wholly unrelated to the course subject matter. In the case of one professor, the emotional trauma of Trump’s presidency eventually caused him to become so uncivil and unprofessional that he has now found himself without a job. The story of how that came about can be instructive for conservative and Christian students who find themselves subjected to pervasive abuse in the classroom.

I find Peterson to be quite an annoying blowhard. Has he read any contemporary atheist philosophers of religion? "Nietzsche this, Dostoevsky that." "Psychological significant of biblical stories" Yawn. He should at least read Hector Avalos, e.g., The End of Biblical Studies.

Since Roe v. Wade, especially in recent years, pro-lifers have made dramatic legislative gains in restricting abortion. Thank God for that. Yet we should never lose sight of the fact that the ultimate goal is to change hearts and minds, not just laws. bit.ly/2JE6FPq pic.twitter.com/kkXZhGXUTW

“The problem of leading a Christian life in a non-Christian society is now very present to us…. And as for the Christian who is not conscious of his dilemma—and he is in the majority—he is becoming more and more de-Christianized by all sorts of unconscious pressure: paganism holds all the most valuable advertising space.”

I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. Yet she will be saved through childbearing — if they continue in faith and love and holiness, with self-control. (1 Timothy 2:12–15)

“The name of the Lord is a strong tower; the righteous man runs into it and is safe. A rich man’s wealth is his strong city, and like a high wall in his imagination” (Proverbs 18:10–11). God uses any means necessary to tear down whatever we hide behind. Our job, reputation, accomplishments, or material possessions may be our fortified city or our imaginary high wall. But anything less than God himself will come up short. “My people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water” (Jeremiah 2:13).

In the first case, your typical question is, “Well, what is wrong with it?” It would apply to movies and music, and kids often ask their parents, “What is wrong with it?” And the other approach is not to ask, “What is wrong with it?” mainly, but, “Will it make me more Christlike? Will it make me more devoted to Jesus? Will I be more powerful and full of the Holy Spirit? Will I be more effective in prayer because of it? Will it make me more bold in witness or weaken me? Will it help me be spiritually discerning of the ways of Satan in the world and will it help me lay up treasures in heaven? Will it help me find joy in God and all that he is for me in Jesus?”

Which leads to where I agree with you. My criticisms of the gay community are one, many are rabid snowflakes who claim victimhood status and demand accommodations. They turn what should be a personal decision into a political platform and preach from the pulpit not allowing any criticism of their lifestyle or community, branding any dissent as “homophobic”. The whole “pride” movement is a radical liberal one that is just as hostile to any dissent in many ways as many religious people are in opposing them. While I’m not against gay relationships, I’m not on the whole LGBT bandwagon. Also of course, I am opposed to the rules that forced the Christian businesses to make things like cakes that go against their religious beliefs. A private business should be able to refuse service if it violates their religious practices. This goes for anyone, not just Christians. A Jewish business shouldn’t be forced to make a neo-Nazi cake, a Muslim business shouldn’t be forced to serve pork or alcohol. I disagree with gays demanding to be accommodated by others by forcing everyone to go along with their agenda, PC speech, and adding caveats when talking about traditional marriage just to be “inclusive”.